


Breaking Skin

by Greatninjamorgan



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Chaptered, Fluff, M/M, WIP, maybe smut later on
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-04
Updated: 2018-02-26
Packaged: 2018-03-05 10:15:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3116354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Greatninjamorgan/pseuds/Greatninjamorgan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Breaking skin... it's all the same at the end of the day, isn't it? AkuRoku fic that I'll probably continue, but we'll see. Any comments are welcome comments!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> It's been a while since I wrote any AkuRoku, so bear with me.

“Well, Pence doesn't wanna do it, and I _really_ don't wanna go on my own...”

Roxas sighed heavily. He had no plans for that afternoon, it was true, and he did kind of owe Olette a favour. But he'd kind of been thinking of letting her copy his Chem homework, or lending her some munny; escorting her to a tattoo parlour was certainly not what he had had in mind. Still, a deal was a deal, and so, sighing, Roxas picked up his bag.

“Fine. But this place had better be legit,Olette.”

“I hope it is.” The crease in Olette's brow suggested that she hadn't actually considered the reputability of the venue she had selected for her tragus piercing. There again, Roxas hadn't really known what a tragus _was_ until today. “I think Selphie got her nose done there...”

People didn't often talk about Selphie's nose piercing, out of kindness, but it had become quite badly infected, so Roxas wasn't remotely reassured by this piece of information.

“Well, it's your ear...”

 ~

The parlour was aptly named Needles, and Roxas was impressed by the cleanliness of the reception area. Of course, nobody was going to be getting a piercing at the reception area, but it helped. The receptionist was a tall, older man, maybe in his early thirties, though the large black eyepatch and grizzly red-brown scar across his cheek made him look far older.

“Can I help you two?” he asked, glancing up from what Roxas had first thought was paperwork, but was in actual fact a photo.

Olette glanced to Roxas for help. “Uh, not me, thanks. Just her.”

“I'd like, um, I'd like my tragus pierced?” It came out as a question.

The man snorted. “You and everyone else in this damn town. You got any ID?”

Olette started to rummage around in her handbag, and Roxas glanced awkwardly up at the shelf behind the receptionist's head. It held a row of bongs, each prettier and more expensive than the last, and Roxas found himself vaguely wishing he did weed just so he'd have an excuse to buy paraphernalia.

“Here you go!” She presented the bored man behind the counter with her provisional driving license.

After a moment of squinting, he reached for something under the desk. “Here,” he said, pulling out a sheet of yellow paper with a flourish. “Consent form. Fill it in, hand it back, pay, and go into the waiting room.”

Olette looked nervous now, but one of Roxas' duties as piercing buddy was to prevent her from chickening out. He handed her a pen and she began to print her name in block capitals on a dotted line.

“That'll do,” said the one-eyed man at long last, “now off you go, waiting room is just around the corner.”

And off they went.

“What if it hurts, Roxas?” Olette whispered as they entered the waiting room. It was an odd mix of people; blonde girls dusted with fake tan that probably wanted their belly buttons done, and people with dyed hair who already looked like pin cushions. There was only one empty chair left, and Roxas let Olette perch on it, hovering next to her with his hands crammed into his pockets.

“I mean, of course it'll hurt, but it'll be over in a second.” He knew he probably wasn't being particularly reassuring. “Besides, think how cute it'll look. And I heard Hayner saying something the other day about how much he likes girls with piercings.” It was a lie, but Olette lit up, and her nervousness seemed to fade almost completely as people trickled one by one into the small room with a door marked “PIERCINGS.”

Finally, a pair of blonde girls scuttled out of the piercing room and a voice called out, “Olette? Olette Pendleton?”

She stood up, grabbing Roxas's wrist instinctively. “Oh, I'm scared!”

“Come _on_ , you'll do fine.”

She took the lead, not letting go of his wrist, as they walked into the room to see the back of someone in a black shirt, with red hair -

“You must be Olette!” He turned around, and Roxas swallowed, almost choking on his own spit. He was – he was - “I'm Axel, come on in, bring your friend, don't be shy.”

Regaining his composure just enough to notice Olette's palm sweating on his wrist, Roxas nudged her, then looked apologetically at Axel. “She's really nervous,” he explained, and she nodded silently.

“Oh, you'll be fine, hop on that chair.” She shuffled towards the chair, hands shaking, whilst Axel busied himself with nitrile gloves and alcohol wipes. “Tragus, was it?”

“Uh-huh.” Olette wriggled on the tattered leather chair, while Roxas was once again doomed to standing awkwardly by her side. “It's my first piercing since my earlobes when I was like eight,” Olette confessed, squirming a little more.

Roxas couldn't stop staring as Axel pulled a pre-packaged needle out of a drawer, followed by some tongs and finally a silver stud. He was... to put it bluntly, he was really fucking hot, but Roaxs didn't want to put it bluntly. Roxas wanted to put it poetically. Roxas wanted to express fully in his own head how beautiful this guy – this _man_ – was.

“You'll be alright. Which ear?” His briskness seemed to be reassuring Olette, or at least not allowing her time to think about what was about to happen.

She pointed to her right ear. “This one, if that's okay.”

“It's your ear.” He shrugged, then opened up his alcohol wipe and started to clean the ear in question. “What about you, blondie? You fancy getting anything done? I'll do it for free.”

Roxas flushed. “Nah – nah, I'm just, Olette's nervous so...”

Axel chuckled as he clamped tongs onto Olette's ear. “Now both of you look terrified! God, is it me? Xigbar told me the hair was a bit much...”

“Xigbar?” Roxas enquired, as Olette reached out for Roxas's hand, and he let her press her too-soft, too-sweaty palm against his.

Axel picked up the needle. Olette had her eyes screwed tight shut, but Roxas was barely paying attention to her. (He was a terrible piercing buddy, he thought distantly. Olette should have enlisted Pence instead.) “Yeah, the grumpy one-eyed dude on reception.” All of a sudden he was pushing a needle into Olette's ear and she was squeaking in pain, crushing Roxas's hand. “ _Th_ _ere_  you go, now we've just gotta get the jewellery in and you're done.

“It huuurts,” Olette wailed, eyes still shut. “Roxas, it huuuurts.”

Unimpressed by Olette's whining, Axel glanced at Roxas before starting to fiddle with Olette's new tragus stud. “Roxas, huh? Cute name. Say, you're alright standing there, aren't you? Should've offered you a seat...” There was another squeak from Olette, then, “All done! Let me get your aftercare instructions, then you're free to go.”

“I'm alright not sitting. There were no chairs in the waiting room for a while so I had to stand then too.” Roxas shrugged. Olette had let go of his hand in order to admire her new piercing in the reflection on her phone, and he subtly wiped her sweat off on his jeans.

Axel tutted as he presented Olette with a sheet of paper. “You should have told someone there were no chairs! I'd have let you sit on my lap.” He winked, then turned to Olette. “You do exactly as that says, and if you have any questions, come back and see us.” She nodded, still looking at her reflection. “Alright, you guys are free to go!”

If Roxas had been more like Hayner, he would've got Axel's number. If he were more like Pence, he would have added him on Facebook. And if he were more like Olette, Axel would probably have made the first move.

But he was passive, awkward Roxas, and he shuffled out of the piercing room after Olette without another word.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> People who don't get enough representation in fanfictions: 1. Asexuals 2. Lesbians 3. Non-binary peeps 4. Xigbar  
> Just saying.

“Pence, can I tell you something?”

After being dragged into several pharmacies to try and find witch hazel to clean Olette's new piercing with (sea salt had been offered as another option, and would probably have been much easier to find, but that was apparently what Selphie had used, so Olette was thoroughly boycotting it), Roxas had dropped by Pence's house and was sitting on the edge of his bed, whilst Pence, cross-legged on the floor, played some trendy smartphone game.

“Sure.”

“Well, I don't know if you noticed but... well, I'm not exactly into, you know, um, girls.”

There was a long pause. Roxas started to panic. He had had to tell _someone_ , and he probably trusted Pence the most, out of his three friends, to be kind about it, but now he was descending into panic, wondering if it had been a mistake, if he should have kept his mouth shut, if –

“Me neither.”

Roxas blinked. Then, more panic; what if Pence thought Roxas was coming out to him as a preface to asking him out?

Pence looked up from his phone. “I guess I've known since I was a kid. I never had crushes on anyone. It's never really bothered me.”

“Never... on anyone? So you're...”

“Asexual.” Pence nodded. “Like, completely. And are you, like...”

Roxas nodded in confirmation, slowly starting to calm down, the pounding of his heart returning to its normal gentle thumping. “I'm gay, yeah.”

“Cool.” Pence picked his phone back up, and all that permeated the silence was the sound of thumbnails tapping on a screen.

 ~

Roxas drew a breath. Then another. Then another. He was back outside of Needles, staring up at the sign like it might give him answers. “Lonely gay redhead inside”, it might say, if he stared at it long enough.

Or, it might continue to say “Needles – tattoos & piercings”.

He had left it three days. Three agonising days. Pence thought that this was a terrible idea. But he was here now, and he shouldered the door open, and stepped gingerly inside.

Xigbar was still on reception,looking for all the world like he hadn't moved in three days, except that this time, instead of a photo, he was gazing down at his phone. Roxas stepped up to the desk nervously and, after the salt-and-pepper-haired man had finished whatever he was reading – which he was taking his sweet time to do – he looked up and raised the eyebrow above his covered eye.

“Back again, huh?” He grinned, quite a frightening grin, and Roxas nodded. “What can I help you with, tiger?”

Roxas didn't blink at being called “tiger”. “Uh, I'd like...” He pointed lamely to his left ear. “Ear pierced,” he finished in a sort of mumble.

Xigbar seemed to grin wider at Roxas' discomfort. “Ear pierced, huh? Can I see some ID?”

He pulled out his passport. Xigbar hardly glanced at it before waving a hand and reaching for a form. “You know the drill.”

When all the paperwork was done, Roxas shuffled into the waiting room, hands shaking. He began to wish he had taken a friend along with him. The longer he sat on the hard plastic chair, the more convinced he became that everyone was staring at him, and that he was going to leave sweat prints on the plastic, and that he was being creepy even coming here when he was totally unsure about getting any piercings at all, ever...

“Okay, uh, Roxas?” Roxas stood up, terror climbing up his slim, tan throat. The door swung open and Axel stood there, a crooked smile on his face, looking straight at him. “Come on in, Roxas.”

He tiptoed into the room, and the door closed itself behind the two of them. What if he was too short to get on the chair? Even if he wasn't, he knew the climb onto it would be graceless and embarrassing. This was a terrible idea, this was a terrible idea...

“Ear lobe, huh? Just the one?” Axel was already organising himself; needle, tongs, jewellery; Roxas was stood, frozen, staring at the leather recliner he was supposed to sit on.

Axel turned around, frowning slightly. Roxas' face burned as the piercer took in his petrified expression. He opened his mouth, but no words came out, and Axel took a step closer.

“Hey, if you're nervous, I'll tell Xigbar to hold onto your paperwork and you can come back later.” Roxas remembered the way that the redhead had flirted with him when he'd been here with Olette, and couldn't help but notice the contrast with today's tender, caring Axel. “But I promise, it doesn't hurt all that much, and you can always take the stud out and let it heal up if you don't like it.”

Roxas felt like he might cry. He had to come clean. He didn't need this piercing-related advice, because he didn't want a piercing. “I don't... I never... uh...”

Axel cocked his head to one side. “Cat got your tongue, cutie?”

“I wanted to ask you out,” he blurted, feeling his blush rising more and more with every passing second. Terrible, terrible idea. He could still run out now, leave the building, never walk down this street again and let Pence say “I told you so” for the rest of forever. “I didn't want my ear pierced, I don't want anything pierced, I wanted... I wanted to ask you out.”

Slowly, slowly, a smile spread across Axel's face. Not a questionable grin like that delivered by Xigbar earlier, but a full-on, sincere smile. “You free on Saturday?”

“Yeah... yeah, Saturday's... yeah.” Roxas had to look away from those endless green eyes. His gaze dropped to Axel's feet, which were clad in serious-looking workboots. “Where...?” Sentences kept dying in his mouth.

“Where shall we go?” Axel finished for him. “Well, d'you like coffee? There's this coffee place near Station Heights we could go to.”

Roxas hated coffee, but he nodded anyway. Coffee places, generally speaking, sold things other than coffee anyway, so he'd be okay. “That'd be great. Afternoon, or...?”

“Afternoon'd be good. I'm free all day, so it's whatever works for you.” Maybe people in the waiting room were wondering just _what_ Roxas was having pierced, for it to take this long. Maybe Roxas didn't care. “Three, maybe?”

“Three is good, yeah.” He was finally able to look up, only to see Axel looking down. His face was gorgeous from every conceivable angle. “I guess I'll see you then.”

Axel looked up at him and smiled again, albeit a little more subtly this time. “See you then, Roxas.”

After an awkward nod, Roxas began to meander out of the room, back through the reception. He glanced at Xigbar on the way out, and, to his surprise, the man spoke.

“He said he'd ask you out if you came back.” Roxas blinked. “He didn't chicken out, did he?”

“No,” said Roxas slowly, “he didn't.”

“Use protection, kid,” Xigbar advised, and Roxas nodded, then made his way out of the door.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I enjoyed writing this probably more than anyone will enjoy reading it.

Roxas was blushing so, so hard. He feared he might burst a blood vessel in his face. And the blushing embarrassed him even more, because he knew that everyone else waiting in line must know why he was blushing.

He told himself that the cashier got this all the time, that she would barely even glance at his items as she scanned them, that he would be out of the store with his purchases in a bag within minutes -

“Who can I help next?”

Barely raising his feet from the ground, Roxas stepped up to the checkout, only to realise, his stomach sinking -

“Roxas!” It was Olette's cousin, Kairi. Her red hair was pulled into a tight ponytail for work, so Roxas almost hadn't recognised her – but it was in fact Kairi who was smiling brightly at him, waiting for him to put his items on the counter.

“Hey, Kairi...” There was no getting around it. He placed the box of Skyn condoms (latex-free, since he hadn't bothered to ask if Axel was allergic) and the small bottle of lube (paraben-free, whatever that meant) onto the counter, then reached for his wallet, avoiding eye contact as though Kairi's gaze might burn him.

Two beeps. She scanned the two items, then shimmied them into a small, mercifully opaque bag. “Anything else I can help you with?”

“Nah, that's – that's it, thanks.” He handed over exact change and slipped his fingers through the bag's handles. “I, uh, I didn't know you worked here.”

Kairi punched some buttons and the cash register punched her in the stomach in return. “I'm new,” she said chirpily, throwing munny into the cash drawer and then pushing it shut. “It was cool bumping into you.”

“And you,” Roxas lied, lifting his bag off the counter. “See you around.”

“Tell Oletter to call me, and have a nice day!” Roxas nodded and, blushing so fiercely he might have been slapped in the face, he left the store.

It could have been worse, he told himself, as he scurried back home. He could have been served by a cute little old lady. Or bumped into his own mother. Or there could have been a problem with the barcode and Kairi might have needed to get the manager out. Overall, it had gone reasonably well.

 ~

When Roxas found the coffee place near Station Heights (which was called Minnie's, and which actually looked quite cute), he could see a bush of spiked red hair through the window and realised that Axel had got there first. A cocktail of terrified and warmed to the core, Roxas tiptoed in and towards the table Axel had claimed.

“Roxas! Sorry about being early, just, y'know, thought I'd grab us a table.” It was nice to see someone other than himself squirm with embarrassment, Roxas thought distantly, as he sank into a chair opposite Axel, the table so tiny that their knees brushed together.

“It's cool, honestly. You picked a nice table.” Any table Axel would've picked would have been the nicest table in the cafe, but still. “So how's, y'know, stuff?”

Axel grinned, shuffling in his chair a little so that his leg was pressed more firmly against Roxas'. That _had_ to be deliberate... “Stuff's good. How's stuff for you? Behaving yourself in school?”

Roxas was vaguely irritated for a split second, but the redhead's charming smile made him soften instantly. "I'm at _university_ \- big kid school. But you _assumed_ that - I could have a full-time job and my own house and – and a car.”

“A car? You'd be doing better than I am then, blondie.” Axel startead to play with a packet of artificial sweetener, and Roxas noticed how long and soft his fingers looked. “Mind you, I've got cash spare to buy you a coffee, so I guess I'm doing well enough.”

Roxas, instinctively it seemed, plucked the sachet of sweetener from between his date's fingers and flipped it over to read it. “Well, I could just eat this Splenda, if you'd rather not pay for coffee.”

Roxas could be perfectly calm and collected when he put his mind to it, and when he was comfortable; since he was rarely comfortable, he spent at least half of his waking life blushing and stuttering. Still, he seemed to be gathering momentum now, sitting opposite a cute guy who was clearly interested in him.

“What kind of guy do you think I _am_ , Roxas?” Axel pressed a hand against his chest, pretending to be deeply wounded. “Of course I'll buy you a coffee. I'll buy you _two_ coffees.”

A stomach grumbled. Probably Roxas', though he could barely feel his own stomach. So much of his mind was tuned to the frequency of Axel's warm knee. “Well, do they do food here? You could be _real_ nice and buy me a slice of cake or something...” He moved his knee back and forth, just a little. Flirting seemed to be far easier than he had anticipated.

Axel pushed his chair back, taking his knee with him, and Roxas felt genuine disappointment. “What kind of cake d'you like, blondie?”

“Chocolate's my favourite, but I'm not fussy.” Well, except for the fact that he hated coffee. “You sure you don't want me to pay?”

Axel shook his head and got to his feet. “You sit there and be cute, I'll only be a minute.”

 ~

After a slice of cake, a bottle of Sprite, the bitter taste of confessing that he didn't like coffee, and a sip of Axel's sugar-saturated Americano (which was awful), Roxas wanted nothing more than to lean across the table and devour Axel's face. They had ended up with their knees even closer than before, limbs tangled together between table legs. They kept brushing each other's hands. Roxas just wanted to kiss the guy.

The guy was, at that moment, enthusing about petitions to ban piercing guns because of the damage they could do to cartilage. “I mean, I know petitions don't do much, but –”

“Axel,” Roxas interrupted, nudging his empty Sprite bottle so it was no longer in between the two of them, “I kinda really wanna kiss you.”

The redhead let out a long sigh. “I thought you were never gonna ask, and I'd have to ramble about piercing stuff forever.”

Clumsily, cautiously, Axel leaned over the table, encasing Roxas's small fingers in his long, warm ones. Roxas leaned up to meet him, and, like two baby moths, their lips bumped together.

And then again.

And then again.

Axel pulled back, blushing faintly, biting his lip. “Uh – I know this is a bit forward, but – do you wanna come to my place?”

Roxas was still in a sort of haze after the kissing. “Uh... what for?”

“More kissing?” Axel shrugged. “Whatever you're comfortable doing, blondie.”

“Yeah, we can, uh, your house...” Roxas was half shy and half ecstatic, and knocked his bottle over with his elbow as he stumbled to his feet. “Thanks – thanks.” He pointed to a crumb-covered plate and the empty green bottle. “Uh... thanks.”

“I heard you the first time, dear.” Axel stood up too, and stretched, his raised arms pulling his shirt up and revealing a strip of taut white skin. “Come on then, we can go back to my place.”

 


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I like the direction I'm going in with this now. It's taking a lot of willpower not to abandon this fic in favour of a XigDem AU I thought of on a train (because I have too much of a thing for XigDem, you don't even know), but I am trying.

Roxas had somehow wrapped a short arm around Axel's waist, and Axel had wrapped a long one around Roxas' shoulders, and they wandered through Twilight Town together, Roxas in too much of a daze to think about which roads they were on or indeed if he recognised the area at all. _I hope he's kidnapping me_ , the blonde thought dimly, as they turned into an alleyway. Kidnapping would be nice. Lots more kissing, and kidnapped people didn't have to finish History assignments, generally speaking. Hmm...

“This is my street,” Axel announced, as they emerged from the other end of the alleyway and onto a rather uninviting road with a sad, shabby apartment block at one end of it. “I live in one of those apartments over there.” _Oh_.

Still, not much could knock Roxas out of his lovestruck, or at the very least bonerstruck haze, and the two of them traipsed towards the building, still very much in the entangled arms situation.

The apartment block had a weird buzzer thing at the entrance, and, mercifully, an elevator – the sooner Roxas was alone with Axel the better. He wasn't having elaborate fantasies about fucking so much as vague thoughts about how lips felt on lips and how Axel's hands might feel on his chest. He just wanted more contact...

“And here it is, blondie!” Axel took a key from his pocket and unlocked the door. It swung open, revealing a small, dingy room with a battered-looking grey sofa on one side and some poor imitation of a kitchen on the other. Roxas didn't let his eyes settle anywhere for very long, suddenly feeling very guilty. He still lived with his mother and, whilst he sometimes complained about not having much breathing room in their cluttered two-bedroom house, it was at least better than this filthy shoebox of an apartment.

“Don't be shy, my furniture doesn't bite.” Axel nudged Roxas into the middle of the room. “You hungry?”

Still full of cake, but more afraid of the state of the kitchen than anything, Roxas shook his head, shifting his weight from foot to foot. “Uh... nice CD rack.” Who even owned CDs any more? Axel had seemed far too charming and sophisticated to own CDs. Still, the CD rack was reasonably nice, and Roxas spotted an eclectic mix of Pearl Jam, Nicki Minaj, Vanessa Mae and Say Anything, all observed in one confused glance.

Axel grinned sheepishly. “I've always liked CDs, I know nobody really uses them these days but...” He shrugged, scratching the back of his neck, then abruptly pointed towards a door. “My room's that way.”

More awkward shuffling. Roxas hoped it wouldn't damage his ankles, all this shuffling. Or his knees. He might need those soon.

Axel's room was a little tidier than the rest of the apartment, leading Roxas to the conclusion that most of Axel's time was spent here. It housed a laptop, which sat half-closed upon a tattered dining chair next to the bed, which actually looked quite inviting, with a thick black duvet and a multitude of pillows. There was a man with priorities; the kitchen may have been a health hazard and a half, but at least he had a comfortable place to lay his head. Roxas found it by halves endearing and mysterious.

Axel perched on his bed and patted the mattress next to him to indicate that Roxas should do the same. He did, settling onto the softness and leaning into Axel slightly. “What d'you think, blondie?” Axel asked.

“About your bed? Pretty nice.” Roxas felt a warm limb wrap around his waist. Hopefully it was an arm. “Um...”

“Um...” Axel repeated teasingly, a smile curving his thin, soft lips. “You're so cute when you're nervous.”

Roxas had found that sharp-edged banter was his favourite form of flirting, and returned with, “You're so cute when you're taking the piss.”

There was more of this, followed by more kissing. Perhaps there was a solid half an hour of kissing; Roxas wasn't keeping track, but if there had been a television in the room, it could have displayed an entire episode of Come Dine With Me, or equally Ben 10, commercial breaks included, in the time that they spent kissing. They started sitting up, and somehow slid backwards, then shuffled, so they were lying face-to-face on Axel's bed, fully clothed, just making out, running their hands over each other, getting to know each other's bodies.

Roxas wasn't sure this was how a typically hook-up went, but it was certainly pleasant.

Eventually they came up for air. “Roxas...” Axel kind of half-gasped, “do you wanna... y'know... take things further?”

Roxas didn't consider the question. He nodded because he knew he was supposed to nod. “I, uh. There's some condoms in my bag.”

That grin again. “I've got condoms too, I'm glad we're both on the same page.” He withdrew one from his back pocket, and Roxas suddenly became aware of his heart pounding in his chest. “How do you wanna do this?”

“Um.” Roxas had been under the impression that Axel would take the lead during this transitional phase. Somehow, he'd got it into his head that shy virgins just kind of let handsome redheads get on with it. He hadn't anticipated being asked his opinion. “I... I don't know. How do you wanna do this?”

Axel, who had been kind of brandishing his condom, tossed it onto the bed, and reached out to stroke Roxas' hair. “You look terrified, Roxas,” he said softly, his tongue wrapping around Roxas' name and making a chill run down his spine. “We don't have to do anything if you don't want to, you know.”

Roxas had somehow forgotten the part wherein he was supposed to want to do things. He had taken Xigbar's aside about using protection to mean that Axel _expected_ sex; now that he thought about it, he would rather prolong things, making the progression from kissing to touching to fucking last over at least a few dates.

“I mean, I'm enjoying the kissing,” he started slowly, “but I'm nervous, and I just... I didn't think... I'm not sure...”

Axel kissed his cheek gently, warm lips on his skin silencing him. “You don't have to tell me why you don't wanna have sex with me, blondie,” he said, “you just have to tell me you'd rather stick to kissing for now. You don't have to explain yourself.”

Relieved, Roxas nodded, and sticking to kissing was exactly what they did.

 ~

“You look like you had a good time,” Roxas' mother observed, as Roxas wandered into the living room - living with his parents was cheaper and more convenient than trying to pay rent on a whole apartment with his measly student loan. “Who was there?”

It took his hormone-addled mind a solid moment to remember what he'd told his mother. Study session, was it? At the library? Who would be studying during Easter break? Why did she still swallow his bullshit - and why did he still lie to her? “Just Olette and Pence. Hayner was at the dentist, I think. We bumped into Selphie as well. It was cool.”

“It sounds nice.” Roxas' mother narrowed her eyes at him a little. She'd always been good at catching him out when he was lying. “You're grinning like a thieving cat, young man. Were you pleased to see Selphie?”

Roxas groaned aloud, which he felt would be the typical hetero response to such a question. “Muu-uum! She's just a friend, honestly. Anyway, what's for dinner?”

So his mother might believe that she was soon to have a daughter-in-law with a scarred left nostril, but at least she didn't know that her only son had spent an afternoon with his tongue in another boy's mouth.

A boy who, for the record, had stuck to the plan and done nothing more adventurous than biting gently on Roxas' lower lip, and who had walked him to the end of his street (“But I won't come to your door, in case your family spots me”) and who had given him his phone number, accompanied by a final frantic kiss before they parted.

“Is it movie night again this Friday?” Roxas' mum asked, interrupting him as he was mentally replaying all the conversations he'd shared with Axel.

Roxas nodded slowly. “At Hayner's this time, I think.”

He kind of couldn't wait to talk to Pence.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's been a hot minute, guys!  
> I went back and made some small edits - the most important being that I've made it super clear that Roxas is at university and therefore over 18.  
> Let's see if I can update this more frequently than every three years from now on, shall we? *sheepish face*

Two hours after their third date, Axel realised that he could never see Roxas again.

The evidence for this had been mounting over the past eighteen days. Just the fact that he had been counting the days since they'd met…

Then there were the  _ thoughts _ . Examining them in detail would require Axel to allow them to take up more space in his mind, and he already felt that they took up too much - but he knew that they needed to stop. He needed them to stop.

So, biting down hard on a hangnail that had been bothering his left hand, he used his right one to delete the number that had just texted him,  _ Home safe, thanks again for a great time ^_^ xxx _ . Then he opened Facebook and removed Roxas from that part of his life too. The taste of his own blood oozed onto his tongue, via his middle finger, and his mind whispered something unwelcome about what Roxas’ blood might taste like.

He'd made the right decision.

~

Xigbar did not think Axel had made the right decision.

“Well, you can't just fuckin’ ghost the kid,” he was insisting to a sleep-deprived Axel, who was absolutely  _ not in the mood _ . “And you've been disgustingly smitten lately, so what's changed?”

Axel looked at his interrogator, who had also been one of his closest friends for three years or so now. He knew that Xigbar wasn't going to let the subject lie. “I… It's hard to explain. But I just… I can't keep seeing him.”

Xigbar’s left eyebrow formed a sceptical arch, and he folded his arms. As far as he was concerned, it looked like Axel was running away from his feelings again, like he'd been doing his whole life. Only, this time, they weren't even  _ bad  _ feelings, and Xigbar didn't want to watch him leave them in the dust. 

Still trying desperately to explain himself, Axel added, “I have these… Thoughts about him. That I've never had about anybody else.”

Xigbar, who clearly wasn't getting it, responded, “Gay thoughts?”

“No! Like… like weird thoughts.” Axel’s voice was cracking a little. “Xig, he's turning me into a psycho.”

Xigbar frowned. “He's annoying you that much already?”

“No…” His voice was coming out strangled now. How could he explain? And the thought of Roxas being annoying was absurd. Who could be annoyed by that precious face, those big blue eyes…? “I… It's complicated.”

“Look, I don't have the patience to decipher your vague bullshit.” Xigbar rubbed the side of his face, and Axel knew he wasn't annoyed, just mystified, at a loss. “Why don't you talk to Naminé about it? She knows shit about feelings, ‘n stuff.”

~

Naminé didn't even wait for Axel to attempt to explain. 

“You need to talk to him about it.” Her head was bent over her sketchbook, her hair hiding her face. The youngest at Needles, and the only girl on the staff, Naminé was insanely talented at sketching tattoos, and pretty good at administering them. She was also the most emotionally intelligent of the lot of them. “Whatever it is. You obviously like him. You need to talk to him about it.”

Axel felt sick at the prospect of talking to him about any of it. He started to explain this: “I can't tell him, because he'll -”

“He won't hate you,” Naminé cut across him, looking up from her sketches to fix him with piercing teal irises. “Give him some damn credit, Axel. Whatever it is, he'll be nice about it. If it's a deal breaker, better that he knows now - but I bet it won't be.” She blew eraser dust off her sketchpad, then regarded it with a frown. “And could you take a look at this for me?”

~

Some readers may be aware that the most difficult circumstances to remain in the closet include when one is lovesick, when one is heartbroken, and when one is drunk.

Roxas was all three, which is how his friends came to know about his three-week fling with a guy.

“I still can’t believe you kept it secret that long!” Olette said, again, whilst topping Roxas’ drink up, again. (The four of them had created an entire jug of some weird Frankenstein cocktail, which included vodka, whiskey, cider and Red Bull, among some more palatable ingredients, and an entire lime sliced into quarters. The more Roxas drank, the less repulsive he found it, until he wasn’t even suppressing a shudder after each mouthful.) “And that you told  _ Pence _ , but not us!”

Hayner wiped some of the group’s concoction from his mouth with the back of his hand. “To be fair, Olette, you haven't shut the fuck up ‘bout it since he told us, which I imagine is what he was afraid of.”

Roxas stared into the muggy contents of his glass and shrugged.

“Plus, coming out is like, a  _ thing _ ,” Pence said. He was the most sober of the four of them, as was usually the case. “Anyway, sounds like the thing with this guy wasn't, y’know, meant to be.”

“He seemed so nice when he pierced my nose, though,” Olette mused. “It's shitty that he just… ghosted you.”

Roxas shrugged again. He didn't want to think too hard about it.

So he sucked down another mouthful of cocktail, and suggested Mario Kart on Hayner’s battered Wii.


End file.
